Chronicle picks up cyclists concerns

Roger on London Road at the cycleway where it is planned to have seven car parking spaces

Last week the Bath Chronicle picked up information from Twowheeslgood post (thank you guys) and twitter comments of cyclists about three developments in Bath – London Road, Widcombe/Rossiter Road and Windsor Bridge. In these developments cycling groups feel that British Cycling’s “cycle-proofing” has not been implemented.  Cycle-proofing is defined below and you can watch Chris Boardman’s video on cycle-proofing (only two minutes) in “Bookmarks” under British Cycling video, on right hand side of this page:

British Cycling’s Chris Boardman has recently set out BC’s aim for all new roads and junctions to be “cycle-proofed”.  Cycle-proofing is British Cycling’s term for the practice of ensuring that cycling is designed into all new roads and junctions. The aim of cycle-proofing is to make travelling by bicycle safer, more convenient and a more desirable form of transport. If new road and junction design achieves this then it has been cycle-proofed.

Response from B&NES officers in the Chronicle missed the point in listing some of the considerable capital investment that is going into cycling in B&NES.   What might have been good would be an admission (by a politician) that there is some truth in cyclists’ claims and that cycle-proofing would be implemented in the Widcombe scheme, where the design has not yet been completed, and in all future schemes.

There has been fantastic capital investment from Government and from the Council into cycling recently, but we still have to embed cycling into the everyday workings of the council. Indeed people on foot and on bikes are at the top of B&NES Transport priority list, so why not say so and make sure that highways design and funding backs this policy up?